An official website of the United States government
Abstract People structure their days to experience events with others. We gather to eat meals, watch TV, and attend concerts together. What constitutes a shared experience and how does it manifest in dyadic behavior? The present study investigates how shared experiences—measured through emotional, motoric, physiological, and cognitive alignment—promote social bonding. We recorded the facial expressions and electrodermal activity (EDA) of participants as they watched four episodes of a TV show for a total of 4 h with another participant. Participants displayed temporally synchronized and spatially aligned emotional facial expressions and the degree of synchronization predicted the self-reported social connection ratings between viewing partners. We observed a similar pattern of results for dyadic physiological synchrony measured via EDA and their cognitive impressions of the characters. All four of these factors, temporal synchrony of positive facial expressions, spatial alignment of expressions, EDA synchrony, and character impression similarity, contributed to a latent factor of a shared experience that predicted social connection. Our findings suggest that the development of interpersonal affiliations in shared experiences emerges from shared affective experiences comprising synchronous processes and demonstrate that these complex interpersonal processes can be studied in a holistic and multi-modal framework leveraging naturalistic experimental designs.
more »
« less
How and Why People Synchronize: An Integrated Perspective
Academic Abstract Interpersonal synchrony, the alignment of behavior and/or physiology during interactions, is a pervasive phenomenon observed in diverse social contexts. Here we synthesize across contexts and behaviors to classify the different forms and functions of synchrony. We provide a concise framework for classifying the manifold forms of synchrony along six dimensions: periodicity, discreteness, spatial similarity, directionality, leader–follower dynamics, and observability. We also distill the various proposed functions of interpersonal synchrony into four interconnected functions: reducing complexity and improving understanding, accomplishing joint tasks, strengthening social connection, and influencing partners’ behavior. These functions derive from first principles, emerge from each other, and are accomplished by some forms of synchrony more than others. Effective synchrony flexibly adapts to social goals and more synchrony is not always better. Our synthesis offers a shared framework and language for the field, allowing for better cross-context and cross-behavior comparisons, generating new hypotheses, and highlighting future research directions.
more »
« less
- Award ID(s):
- 2145385
- PAR ID:
- 10508607
- Publisher / Repository:
- SAGE Publications
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Personality and Social Psychology Review
- ISSN:
- 1088-8683
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
More Like this
-
-
With few exceptions, most research in automated assessment of depression has considered only the patient’s behavior to the exclusion of the therapist’s behavior. We investigated the interpersonal coordination (synchrony) of head movement during patient-therapist clinical interviews. Participants with major depressive disorder were recorded in clinical interviews (Hamilton Rating Scale for Depression, HRSD) at 7-week intervals over a period of 21 weeks. For each session, patient and therapist 3D head movement was tracked from 2D videos. Head angles in the horizontal (pitch) and vertical (yaw) axes were used to measure head movement. Interpersonal coordination of head movement between patients and therapists was measured using windowed cross-correlation. Patterns of coordination in head movement were investigated using the peak picking algorithm. Changes in head movement coordination over the course of treatment were measured using a hierarchical linear model (HLM). The results indicated a strong effect for patient-therapist head movement synchrony. Within-dyad variability in head movement coordination was higher than between-dyad variability, meaning that differences over time in a dyad were higher as compared to the differences between dyads. Head movement synchrony did not change over the course of treatment. To the best of our knowledge, this study is the first attempt to analyze the mutual influence of patient-therapist head movement in relation to depression severity.more » « less
-
Abstract As people coordinate in daily interactions, they engage in different patterns of behavior to achieve successful outcomes. This includes both synchrony—the temporal coordination of the same behaviors at the same time—and complementarity—the coordination of the same or different behaviors that may occur at different relative times. Using computational methods, we develop a simple framework to describe the interpersonal dynamics of behavioral synchrony and complementarity over time, and explore their task-dependence. A key feature of this framework is the inclusion of a task context that mediates interactions, and consists of active, inactive, and inhibitory constraints on communication. Initial simulation results show that these task constraints can be a robust predictor of simulated agents’ behaviors over time. We also show that the framework can reproduce some general patterns observed in human interaction data. We describe preliminary theoretical implications from these results, and relate them to broader proposals of synergistic self-organization in communication.more » « less
-
Autistic students often struggle to engage with peers in integrated education; however, research has largely focused on individual characteristics rather than the interpersonal and environmental factors affecting peer engagement. This mixed-methods study examined longitudinal peer interactions over a school year among 17 adolescents (seven were autistic) in an inclusive school club. The quantitative phase investigated participants’ social behavior rates to identify sessions where each student demonstrated high and low peer engagement compared with their average participation levels. The qualitative phase compared social interactions and contexts between sessions of high and low peer engagement, revealing four themes regarding contextual supports and barriers to autistic peer engagement: (1) peer engagement is a participatory process where a student and their peer(s) navigate mutual understanding, shaped by both student and peer social characteristics, openness, and involvement; (2) student–peer synchronicity, such as shared interests or compatibility of social styles, was essential to autistic peer engagement; (3) peer engagement can be supported by activities facilitating joint engagement and exploration of mutual interests; (4) classroom interventions emphasizing strengths can support peer engagement, while normative behavioral standards without peer education on individual differences and diversity can perpetuate peers’ negative perceptions of autistic difficulties. Lay abstractPeer engagement is essential but often challenging for autistic students in integrated education, especially for adolescents. Although peer engagement is bidirectional and context-dependent, research has largely focused on individual characteristics rather than the interpersonal and environmental factors affecting peer engagement. This mixed-methods study examined peer interactions over a school year among 17 adolescents (seven were autistic) in an inclusive school club at a public middle school in the Northeastern United States. The study began with a quantitative phase identifying sessions in which each student was socially engaged with peers more or less often than usual for them. We then qualitatively compared the social interactions and contexts between sessions where each participant experienced high and low peer engagement. Thematic analysis revealed four themes regarding contextual supports and barriers to autistic peer engagement: (1) peer engagement is a participatory process where a student and their peer(s) navigate mutual understanding, shaped by both student and peer social characteristics, openness, and involvement; (2) student–peer synchronicity, such as shared interests or compatibility of social styles, was essential to autistic peer engagement; (3) peer engagement can be supported by activities facilitating joint engagement and exploration of mutual interests; (4) classroom interventions emphasizing strengths can support peer engagement, while normative behavioral standards without peer education on individual differences and diversity can perpetuate peers’ negative perceptions of autistic difficulties. The findings have implications for better inclusive practice to support autistic social participation by modifying the peer environments, activities, and classroom interventions.more » « less
-
This work presents the research methods and preliminary results from a pilot study that assesses mentoring approaches used to support racially minoritized students in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields. There is a national imperative to broaden participation of racially minoritized undergraduates in STEM fields as evidenced by reports and the recent calls for social justice and equity in these fields. In STEM, mentoring has been recognized as a mechanism that can help to support racially minoritized student populations (e.g., persons who identify as Black, Hispanic/Latinx, and American Indian/Alaskan Native). Yet for mentors in higher education, minimal examples exist that detail effective mentoring approaches, strategies, and competencies that support the persistence and success of minoritized mentees in STEM. In better understanding mentoring approaches, we can make visible how to better mentor these populations and help to employ more equitable mentoring participation. The research question guiding this study is: What approaches are used by mentors who help racially minoritized undergraduate mentees persist in STEM fields? Mentoring literature and two theoretical frameworks were leveraged to situate these mentoring experiences. Intersectionality theory is used to explore the role of compounding minoritized identities within the power contexts (i.e., structural, hegemonic, disciplinary, and interpersonal) of higher education. Community cultural wealth is also used as a lens to examine six forms of capital (i.e., family, social, navigational, aspirational, resistant, and linguistic) that may be used in mentoring practices with minoritized students. This paper will present the methods and findings from the pilot study, centering on the development of the team’s interview protocol. This work will provide insights about the piloting process of a larger study as well as initial emergent themes about the approaches and experiences of mentors who mentor minoritized undergraduate students in STEM.more » « less
